Add a Background Picture to an Email On the Fly in Outlook 2007
Our forum administrator Scott showed me an interesting trick in Outlook 2007 where you can assign any picture as the background to an email. Since this was news to me, I figured that I'd write it up for everybody else.
You should use this feature with caution, of course, since it will increase the size of the email and if you choose a really obnoxious image it will also annoy whoever you are sending the email to. Note that this feature is different from the Stationery feature in Outlook, which we'll cover at another time.
Adding a Background Picture
Open up a new email, click on the Options tab and then the Page Color drop-down button, and then the Fill Effects item at the bottom of the menu.
Note that you'll need to have your email in HTML or Rich Text mode for this to work.
You can use the Textures or Patterns on the various tabs if you like, although none of them are that great.
Or you can choose a particular picture from the Picture tab by using the Select Picture button to browse and find a file. You'll want to make sure to choose an image that can be tiled, and also make sure that it's small since it's going to be included in the email.
You'll notice that this particular image doesn't tile very well…
And since it's not mostly dark or mostly light, the text is barely readable.
Instead you want to choose a background image that can tile and is either mostly dark or mostly light colored.
Of course, you should always use this feature with caution. Nobody wants to get some gigantic picture as the background image for an email.
If you like to do that, I recommend to fade the picture to make it look like a watermark. Else it will be difficult to read the text.
I've tested background images before and had some problems with a few web-based email giants out there not displaying the image. But that was maybe 5 years ago. I've got a couple questions for anyone who might know. Does Hotmail, Yahoo!, etc. all display the background image or does it come through as an attachment? Will email clients such as Outlook prompt you to download the images if the sender is "unverified" or whitelisted? The reason I ask is I'm thinking about a newsletter for my site and wanted to find out if an HTML email is worth the potential hassle.
Thanks in advance!
Not all mail servers support HTML, but I don't have a list. I know that e.g. AOL does not. The other problem to consider is the additional time it takes to send such a mail if your outbound mail is checked by your security system. That and the HTML problem was one reason I stopped using Incredimail - which is quite fancy..
In Outlook 2007 my Options Page Color is grayed… how can I get it back? I'm assuming I'm not alone on this(?).
Place cursor in message field and click. Page Color options should then appear.
Additional Question:
Is there anyway to avoid the tile effect and have a single instance of the picture fill the entire message field? Thanks for all replies!
SKBrown